First Day of School 2012

The girls started school on August 15th.  It seemed a little early, but I was really glad to get back to a schedule.  The bus is picking them up about 10 minutes sooner than it did last year, but on the first day, it was about 20 minutes late and so the girls were late for school.  Oops.  Things have gotten better though.  A lot of parents didn't sign up for the bus until the last minute and so the bus coordinator cut one of the routes and then added extra stops to the two other buses.  Now, the two buses that are running are completely packed, and there is a huge waiting list.

Lucky for me, the girls were so excited for their first day of school.  They picked out their clothes the night before and wanted to by matchy-matchy.  It was so cute.  Ashley even wanted their hair to be the same, but Amelia didn't want her hair in a pony tail.  I thought we were going to have a major break down but I was able to fix the problem by telling Ashley that if they were completely matchy-matchy, people might get them mixed up.  That did the trick.  Ashley was fine with Amelia having a different hair-do after that.

A little note on the girls' skirts... Over the summer, I made them some cute skirts that were easy to make and fun to wear.  I got the idea to make uniform skirts too.  Since my girls are tall, it is hard to find skirts that are long enough for school.  I was able to buy good quality, heavy material for about $5 a yard.  So far, I have made khaki and black skirts for them, and I have the blue one all cut out and ready to be sewn together.  Hopefully I will get a little tutorial up soon on how I did it, but if you are itching for a little sewing project, go here and you will get the general idea.

Family Hiking Day

What better way to spend a day together as a family than to do a little hiking?  Guy and I were looking for an easy hike to do with the kids so we drove up Payson Canyon to the Grotto.  Amelia did this little hike as a Kindergartener so I figured that we could probably handle it.  The kids loved playing in the waterfall at the end of the hike even though it was pretty cold.  Micah loved playing in the dirt and rocks.

Guy also wanted to do a little recon for his hike to the Nebo summit coming up later this month.  We hiked the first little bit together, then he went on for about another 15 minutes while I took all the kids back to the bathroom.

Since we were so close, I suggested that we go to Devil's Kitchen.  You would have thought that I was torturing the kids to do another hike.  This was more like a little walk since it was paved and flat the whole way.  They did like it once they got there.

Field Trip to Temple Square

I was in need of a little get away with the kids at the beginning of August so I planned a little trip to the Church History Museum and the Visitor Center on Temple Square.  I picked my mom up from work and we were off on our little adventure.  Before we went up to the Children's Museum with all the hands-on activities, we walked around the main floor of the museum.  Elliot kept saying that this place was "creeping him out" so we didn't spent much time down there.  Once upstairs, Amelia was all over the activities.  She loved dancing, fishing, and anything else that she could find.  Ashley was a bit more timid and pretty much hung out by me.  Elliot didn't think that anything was any fun.  He finally did find something that he liked (a bicycle wheel that you could turn and watch the pom-poms inside cascade over the spokes) and then got his finger smashed by it.  So, our fun was all over.  Micah hung out in the stroller most of the time which was really nice.

After the museum, we dashed across the street to see the Christus.  I figured that it was something that we couldn't pass up since we were so close.  Amelia enjoyed taking lots of pictures while we were there.

From across the room, I saw our old home teacher so I just had to go over and say hello.  He was there with an EFY group.

After this, we were all pretty hungry so we went to the kid's favorite place to eat, Arby's.  Then we were off to my mom's house.  She called her sister Linda to bring her grandson's, Josh and Cash, over to her house and we got out the pool for the kiddos.  They had so much fun.  Even Micah was enjoying being in the pool. I stayed for dinner that night, then left the girls to have a little sleepover with grandma and I took the boys back home.  Now, Elliot keeps asking when he gets to have his sleepover.  Hopefully it will be soon.

Time Out

 Elliot quite often will earn time outs during the day.  Usually it is for arguing, saying "hate" or other bad words, being mean to his brother or yelling excessively.  Time outs have been a little bit more frequent this summer since he has to get along with his two sisters plus one brother all day long.  And that is a long time when you are three.  One Sunday, he was being particularly awful so I sent him to the steps.  He sat there for a minute whining and complaining about it and then everything went quiet.  When I went to check on him, I found this...

(Yes.  That is a Strawberry Shortcake scooter by him.  He loves that toy.)

I left him on the steps for about a half hour and then he started to wake up.  I thought that he would be ready to eat some dinner so I sat him at his place at the table.  Instead, he just cried and whined.  So, Guy put him in his bed.  He then fell right back asleep.  When bedtime came about an hour later, we took him potty and put on some jammies, and then it was right back to bed.  I was really worried that he would wake up in the middle of the night hungry, but he didn't.  He pretty much slept from about 6:00 Sunday night to 7:30 the next morning.  The best part was that he was much happier when he woke up the next morning.

Splash Park

Lara was so nice and invited us to go to the splash park with her this summer.  It was on my list of things to do, but sometimes you just need a friend to give you a little nudge to do something.

The kids had a blast and didn't want to leave.

 Micah decided to hang out with me.

 Elliot did not like water getting in his eyes.  Whenever it did, he came over and dried off his eyes.

 Amelia posing with the water.

 Love this boy's farmer tan.

 Ashley loved playing right in the center.

Giving the water a hug.

Fiesta Days Parade

Amelia was excited to dance again with the ALA drill team in the Fiesta Days Parade on the 24th of July.  Ashley kept herself entertained by putting Piggy Puppet over Puppy's head.  It was pretty funny.

Make-Your-Own Pizza Night

One of my new favorite things to do for dinner is make-your-own pizza.  I started this with the hope that the kids would be more willing to eat dinner if they have a hand in making it.  Plus, it is really fun to decorate your own pizza.  Amelia usually makes a face out of her olives and one night, Ashley did a CTR shield.  It is so fun to see them be creative.

In case you were wondering, here is my recipe for Easy Pizza Dough.  This recipe makes 2 large crusts, which works perfectly for our family to each have their own personal size pizza.  Sometimes I even have enough left over dough to make a dessert pizza.  Yum!

Easy Pizza Dough

4 - 4 1/2 cups flour
2 envelopes fast-rising yeast (dry)
1 teaspoon sugar
2 teaspoons salt
2 teaspoons olive oil
1 3/4 cups water

Mix 3 cups flour, yeast, sugar and salt in a large bowl.  Mix together warm water (110 degrees) with olive oil.  Stir into the flour mixture with a wooden spoon; beat until smooth.  (I actually do all this in my mixer with the dough hooks attached.)  Add enough of the remaining flour gradually to form a soft, firm dough.

Knead on a lightly floured surface for 8-10 minutes or until smooth and elastic.  Let rest, covered with plastic wrap, for 10 minutes.

Roll the dough on a lightly oiled or cornmeal dusted baking sheet or stretch with hands to desired size.  Bake on the lowest oven rack at 500 degrees for 10-14 minutes or until crisp and brown on the bottom.

New Couches

I have been wanting/needing new couches for the longest time.  The couch that we had in the basement was from my dad's house and it was falling apart.  In fact, it had been falling apart for the past few years.  So, one day, I called my sister to come shopping with me at RC Willey.  I had done some window shopping previously and I thought that I knew what I wanted for the basement.  But when Tamara and I saw it and sat on it, I realized that the couch I had first picked out, was actually, awful.  So, around the showroom we went in search of my perfect couch.  We finally found "the one" and got it on order.  Then, I figured that as long as we were there, I may as well show her the couch that I was thinking of for the living room upstairs.  The price had dropped dramatically since the last time that I had looked at it so I decided to get two of them.  I think I made my saleslady very happy.  I bought four couches plus the fabric protector plus the delivery.  What a day.  And I did it all with four kids in tow.  So happy for my new furniture.

Fireplace Makeover

When we first moved into our house, we pretty much stayed upstairs most of the time.  As time went by, we moved the TV downstairs along with most of the kids toys and now we spend a lot of time in the basement.  For the first 4 years or so of living in this house, we never built a fire downstairs but we were thinking of getting a wood burning stove to help with heating the basement in the winter.  Through some sort of tax incentive program, we were able to get a new wood burning stove and get a tax credit for it.  Win-win!

Now, the mantel was quite neglected.  Amelia even called it the "broken toy shelf" since that was the spot that I always put toys that were in need of some repair.  I'm very ashamed to admit that some toys sat up there for years.  One day, I decided to clean it off along with the hearth and get ready for some decorating.  The decorating still isn't done, but it has stayed cleaned off.  The only thing that I don't know what to do with is all the wood and other fire starting materials in the winter.  I love the look of the hearth now and I really don't want it cluttered again with all of that stuff.

 Our favorite thing to do in the winter now is heat water on top of the stove and drink hot chocolate downstairs.  Somehow, it is more magical to drink hot chocolate in the basement.